A Carbon Credit Card?

June 7, 2007

How would a carbon credit card work? The UK’s Sustainable Development Commission has an informative website on this issue, excerpts of which are shown below.

Imagine the scenario…it is 2015, and you are buying fuel for your hybrid car.

You go to pay, and are told that your purchase will cost £100, plus 50 carbon credits.

Thankfully, you have just received your regular top-up of free carbon credits into your online carbon account, which already has a healthy balance due to your low carbon consumption. So you hand over your carbon debit card, and the credits are electronically taken from your account in real-time. This saves you having to buy the units at the point of sale, which at current market prices would cost you £25.

Sounds far-fetched? Well maybe not. The Sustainable Development Commission (SDC) recently recommended that the [UK] Government should seriously consider the possibility of extending ‘cap and trade’ schemes for carbon dioxide (CO2) across the whole economy, to cover individuals, as well as business and the public sector. This would enable us to achieve guaranteed, annual cuts in our national ‘carbon budget’, and eventually reduce our emissions by at least 60% by 2050 – meeting the Government’s long term target.

Individuals would be given a free allocation of carbon credits, on a per capita basis, which they would use to pay for purchases of electricity, petrol and gas. People that are low carbon consumers would be able to sell their surplus credits on the carbon market, whilst those with a high consumption would have to buy.

The cost of carbon would therefore become included in everyday decision-making, which would promote energy efficiency and behavioural change, whilst encouraging the development of new low carbon technologies.

The idea would be very environmental friendly, but making it into practice without any commercial benefit would probably be somewhat difficult to execute. It is like squeezing in those carbon credits into global currency system as carbon credits in some country may have different price with others.

Hey,Lets talk about reaching to common man rather than Large Scale Industries Check this idea http://bit.ly/5lmUPb & make the carbon credit for the people & of the people.
regards,
an environmentalist
cmon together “LETS DO IT”!!

I don’t know about you, but I am finding it a lot easier to communicate with people who say AGW is negligible rather than those who would lecture me about the ethics of consumption…as if that was what was at stake in geopolitics !
Not that consumption isn’t the issue that needs to be addressed…but this is a very strange way of going about it…starting with the usual thieves who can be guaranteed to line their pockets first..
Here’s my window into the brouhaha
opitslinkfest.blogspot.com>Topical Index>Climate in Contention

Pokfulam Reservoir

About This Blog

This blog was started by Dr. Lucy Cummings (LMCinHK) as a platform for MIPA (Master of International and Public Affairs) students at the University of Hong Kong (HKU) to publicly grapple with a broad range of international relations theories and questions. It has now been reincarnated to serve a broader group of HKU students who are focusing on questions of IR as well as Human Security. We have chosen this public forum to share our views in the hope that the threat of a bit of public humiliation will help sharpen our thinking. Your comments & questions are welcome.